MMaxi08

Painting on the Poster Self-Portrait with Hand to Cheek, 1910 Abertina, Vienna.
The book "Egon Schiele Love and Death" by Jane Kallir is one of my favorit Art Books of all time.

Guernica is a painting by Pablo Picasso, inspired by Picasso's horror at the Nazi German bombing of Guernica, Spain on April 26, 1937 during the Spanish Civil War. The air raid destroyed the city, killing an estimated 1600 people and injuring many more.

The huge mural was produced under a commission by the Spanish Republican government to decorate the Spanish Pavilion at the Paris International Exposition (the 1937 World's Fair in Paris). Picasso said as he worked on the mural:
"The Spanish struggle is the fight of reaction against the people, against freedom. My whole life as an artist has been nothing more than a continuous struggle against reaction and the death of art. How could anybody think for a moment that I could be in agreement with reaction and death? ... In the panel on which I am working, which I shall call Guernica, and in all my recent works of art, I clearly express my abhorrence of the military caste which has sunk Spain in an ocean of pain and death".

Today, Guernica symbolizes the destructive impact of all war.

I remember visiting the Musée National Picasso on my first ever visit to Paris. I think some time in 1989.
It was the first time I was ever in a Museum, not counting the small museum of Sacred Art in Funchal Madeira.
I got a terrible Headache at the time, not because i did not like the experience on the contrary.
I loved it, I made the mistake of triyng to see the all Museum in one visit.
I was not sure at the time if i was going to ever return to Paris.
Now I try to visit the Picasso Museum everytime i'm in Paris.
I will visit the Museo Reina Sofia in Madrid where Guernica is on display soon.
Thank you cexhib.
MMaxi 
 

Caravaggio
Biography

Full Name:
Michelangelo Merisi di Caravaggio
Born:
1571
Died:
1610
Michelangelo Merisi left his birth town of Caravaggio in the north of Italy to study as an apprentice in nearby Milan. In 1593 he moved to Rome, impatient to use his talents on the biggest stage possible.

Caravaggio's approach to painting was unconventional. He avoided the standard method of making copies of old sculptures and instead took the more direct approach of painting directly onto canvas without drawing first. He also used people from the street as his models. His dramatic painting was enhanced with intense and theatrical lighting.

Caravaggio's fate was sealed when in 1606 he killed a man in a duel. He fled to Naples where he attempted to paint his way out of trouble, he became a Knight, but was then imprisoned in Malta and then finally he moved to Sicily. He was pardoned for murder in 1610, but he died of a fever attempting to return to Rome.

Simon Schama on Caravaggio


"In Caravaggio's time it was believed that artists were given their talent by God to bring beauty to the world and to put mortal creatures in touch with their higher selves or souls. Caravaggio never did anything the way it was supposed to be done.

In this painting of the victory of virtue over evil it's supposed to be David who is the centre of attention, but have you ever seen a less jubilant victory? On his sword is inscribed "Humilitus Occideit Superbium", that is, humility conquers pride. This is the battle that has been fought out inside Caravaggio's head between the two sides of the painter that are portrayed here.

For me the power of Caravaggio's art is the power of truth, not least about ourselves. If we are ever to hope for redemption we have to begin with the recognition that in all of us the Goliath competes with the David."

 
Study after Velázquez's Portrait of Pope Innocent X (1953) (Des Moines)

Completed, and delivered to the Beaux-Arts gallery in February 1953, of Study after Velázquez's Portrait of Pope Innocent X (1953), Bacon said "I wanted to paint a head as if folded in on itself, like the folds of a curtain. The Titian Portrait of Cardinal Filippo Archinto (c.1551-1562) is often cited as an ancestor to this device.

Francis Bacon (28 October 1909 – 28 April 1992) was an Anglo-Irish figurative painter. He was a collateral descendant of the Elizabethan philosopher Francis Bacon. His artwork was well-known for its bold, austere, and often grotesque or nightmarish imagery.